Christian dating books for men

True, these passages refer to marriage, but it is wise and right to set patterns that will serve you well in marriage, especially if one accepts the premise that the purpose of dating is to find a marriage partner.

In my view, if you can't happily picture yourself married within a year, you're not in a position to date.

Third, once you decide that you are ready to date, look to God's Word to decide the kind of person to date, and evaluate potential dating partners on those criteria, rather than relying primarily on the world's treatment of ideas like "attraction" and "chemistry." I wrote at some length on this in my article, "Brother, You're Like a Six." For you busy singles with time for only one mildly irritating column per day, the summary is this: Pick a potential dating partner with an eye toward godly manhood and womanhood — with an eye toward who would make a good husband or wife, defined by those characteristics esteems in His Word, not the ones Hollywood likes.

Finally, let me advocate the initiating of a relationship under some accountability structure.

I mentioned the woman's father or family because until the second half of the 20th century, that's largely how it was done.

The idea was to protect the woman from potential hurt or awkwardness, to aid her in evaluating a man whom she might not have known well at the time of his initiation, and to help ensure that the relationship was carried out honorably.

Certainly, this norm spread beyond the believing community and became more of a cultural phenomenon, but it still gels well with attempts to carry out a godly dating relationship — especially among those believers who hold a complementarian view of biblical gender roles.The command in Genesis to be fruitful and multiply is a general command. As it is the man's God-given role to initiate, so it is the woman's God-given role to respond.When Paul extols singleness in 1 Corinthians 7 (which is an often-misused passage in this area of life), it is singleness for the purpose of enhanced If you are floating around staying single because you enjoy social flexibility or having time to yourself or hanging out with the guys or because you have worldly ideas about the perfect woman or how to approach marriage, consider: Are you approaching manhood and marriage biblically? Her response may be positive or negative, it may occur through her father, her family or words directly to her potential suitor.Ultimately, this means learning to trust God's goodness and sovereignty.Clearly, this is not the popular secular view of the "liberated" woman's role.As a practical matter, are you responsible and holy in the way you possess your own spirit, mind and body?